The Dot Hack Trilogy Part One: Dot Hack: Aura
by MeilinII
Summary: Sequel kind of to the .hack series. Full summary is in the first chapter! Rated for complicated themes. Understood easiest if you've read or played or watched all the Dot Hack series.


Meilin: Here it is, my long-awaited Dot Hack fic!

Tsukasa: Long awaited by who? I'm just waiting to get out of here. As I have been since you were in Seventh Grade writing that novel, Toxicity on Schweppes name!

Meilin: -_Waves him off_- Details, details... Either way, now that I've officially finished everything in the Dot Hack English language franchise, it's time to take the reins myself.

Dark: You actually WAITED?

Meilin: When you're talking about something as many-layered, complicated and evolving as Project Dot Hack, you don't have much of a choice. -_Pouty face_- Anyways, this will be another Trilogy, but this time, the different parts will detail different parts of Aura's coming to be. Part one, .hack/Nightfall, will detail the birth of Aura, part two, .hack/Epitaph will detail the destruction of Morgana, and part three, .hack/Kaze will detail the life of Aura's child, who may or may not be Zefie. (I'll leave you hanging)

Disclaimer: I do not own Dot Hack, or 'The World' and I DEFINATELY don't own ADVisions. Dot Hack is the property of Bandai and ADVisions is the property of John Ledford; I just borrowed them for use in my warped version of Dot Hack. I don't own Hotaru, Balmung, Sanjuro, or any other Dot Hack character. I do own Chloe, Sakura, Meilin, Mordicus, Kirika and Ichigo, who are based on my real-life Best Friend (Schweppes), my Real-Life sister (Sakura-Chan) and my Real-Life co-worker (Megumi-Senpai).

Meilin: Without further ado, I present to you the main cast of characters of my story and its Prologue.

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Introduction:  
The Harald System. Introduced to each new version of 'The World' as part of its core structure, its true nature has never been understood. What is known by the Japanese management of CCCorp is that its core purpose is to create 'The World's' final mystery…. Its God. To do so, it creates a number of vagrant AI that unbalance the games systems in the process of gathering data on the subjects the God would soon rule. With 'The World' servers being totally separate, 'Aura' the Goddess of Twilight, has been born at separate times on separate servers. She is different, but the same. It has been a year since the last Hero of Twilight on the Japanese Server appeared. But now, it's the American Servers turn.

Characters:

Hotaru:  
Hotaru has been playing for a year now. Though her character is essentially the same on both servers, her level is still low due to her need to work on two characters. She has somewhat overcome her reluctance to kill monsters. She has raised gruntys on both servers, Aqua Grunties that she now rides everywhere.

Sanjuro Suunarashi:  
Sanjuro has been playing "The World" for six years and is among the most powerful players in the English version. He visits the Japanese Server often, but her usually plays in America with Hotaru.

Balmung:  
Having moved to America at Nineteen after testing Shugo, Balmung is now a translator working for ADVisions: Dallas. He still plays "The World," and though his character model is the same, his level is much lower. However, he is still very strong and well respected. He often plays with Sanjuro and Hotaru, and also with Meilin, who hero-worships him. He visits the Japanese Server only for special events.

Meilin AKA Hinata:  
Her character is a werewolf, almost as tall as Balmung. Her paws stick out from under loose, sky-blue pants, over which hangs her formfitting black T-shirt. On the shirt is the symbol of her Water Wave. Tufts of Lavender fur at her wrists and neck match the long hair that cascades down her back. Her wolf ears sit upon her head. She wears fingerless black gloves on her hands and a white guard on her right arm. A rare headband is usually tied around her neck, purple, with the symbol for 'Wolf' engraved on the metallic front in Kanji. Below it, her characters small, diamond-shaped pendant glitters like winters full moon. Sometimes she moves the headband across her face, over her forehead, or back for use as a hairband.  
She's a Rare Hunter and a Quest Guide. For money or items, she will guide other players through even the most dangerous special events in the game. She's gained a reputation for being the best, but she's also known for her somewhat borderline item-collecting practices. She doesn't actively PK, but if you're between her and a one-of-a-kind treasure, run. Run fast. She hero-worships her friend Balmung and is secretly crushing on him.  
IRL, Meilin is an 18-year-old fresh out of High School, attending a community college in preparation for a teaching job in Japan. During the day, she works as a voice at the ADVisions: Fort Worth recording studio. Her voice has been featured on a number of popular anime, and she's attended conventions to speak to her devoted fanbase. Unbeknownst to her, this fanbase includes Balmungs' real-life persona: Zack.  
In reality, Meilin is a small girl, barely passing five feet, with long, dark hair that flows to the small of her back. Her outfits generally consist of loose pants in whites, blacks and blues and T-shirts in whites, blacks, reds, purples, and blues. Most of these have emblems and pictures of the anime she enjoyed or the characters she voiced. She only wears sneakers, and she wouldn't be caught dead in a dress. Her skirts are always knee-length or longer and her hair is usually braided or in a ponytail.

Chloe AKA Kirika  
Chloe is Meilin's childhood friend. A 17-year-old senior in High School, she still lives in their childhood hometown of New York City. Their only contact is through the Internet.  
A punk girl with purple hair and gothic clothes, Chloe is as cool and calm as Meilin is hyper and spastic. She prefers to let Meilin do the talking and focus on the fights. Her wavemaster avatar online has spiky purple hair and wears a slim black skirt with the yellow symbols of her Thunder Wave below a belly shirt adorned with bat wings. Her skin is pale, but the look wasn't complete until they discovered the rare item 'demonic teeth' in a dungeon. Despite her fondness for rare items, Meilin gave it to Chloe, later acquiring another for herself. Now looking every bit the vampire, she wandered 'The World,' scaring the young and the newbs into thinking she's a monster let loose in the town. She doesn't hesitate to kill the stupid or the annoying.

Sakura AKA Ichigo  
Sakura is Meilin's thirteen-year-old younger sister. An advanced student, she is already a freshman in High School. As dark as Chloe is fair and as tall as her sister is short, Sakura stands out among the two not only because of that but also because of her bubble-gum pink hair. She works as a waitress at a cosplay cafe to fund her tuition and is vice-president of her schools anime society. She's involved in Volleyball, Lacrosse, and Drama Club, and is also the star of the chorus. She's bossy, overbearing and sarcastic, but she means well.  
Online, Sakura's avatar is a Heavy Blade of unremarkable level. Her hair is blue in a samurai ponytail and her clothes resemble those of a Geisha. Her skin is dark and her sleeves are adorned with the symbols of her Earth Wave. She role-plays a traveling minstrel.

Megan AKA Mordicus  
Megan is an artist working with ADVision in the audio editing and web page design departments. She's a creative person by nature who draws doujinshi Meilin writes. She's constantly wearing black and purple and is a total pyromaniac. At her job, Megan helps Meilin with her vocal warm-ups, and they both eat and play 'The World' together after work.  
Online, her character is a Blademaster clad in a violet outfit with black armor. Leader of the clan that Kirika is a member of, the Madosa Guild, she leads her vampiric, demonic, and outcasted armies to war amongst the monsters and the knights alike. Apart from being the leader of a PK army, she is also and intelligence officer, a rumor collector, and a peddler of secrets. If you need data on a monster, player, or field, she's the one to ask. She'll have her network of guild officers gather information, for the right price. She's renown to bi-server players as 'The Wiseman of the West.'

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Hinata smiled. Pulling the headset over her head and her VR sensors on her arms, she clicked the 'Log In' button on her computer. Immediately the headset beeped on and she was immersed in her 3-D virtual reality game drug: 'The World."

------------------------------------------- Mac Anu ----------------------------------------------

Meilin logged into her hometown. Mac Anu was a gorgeous city of water build from red stone and Hinata loved it here. That was why she chose it as the hometown of her avatar, Meilin. The werewolf clenched and unclenched her fist. Game of not, 'The World' was incredibly real. Leaving her logging point insider her home, she headed for the chaos gate, intent on heading for a field, when a flash mail icon popped up. Selecting it, she decided to hook up with Balmung in Dun Lorieag instead.

------------------------------------------- Dun Lorieag ------------------------------------------

"Heeeey! Baltan!" she called, her voice changer/translator off. She didn't change her voice online. It was too troublesome to keep track of and she didn't role-play much anyway. Not like her friends. They were all very different online, wanting to escape from home.

The white-haired Blademaster turned to her and smiled. "Ah, Meilin. I see you got my e-mail. Finally."

Hinata had her avatar sweatdrop. "Uh.. Sorry... I just got back from Fanimecon in Houston..." Which wasn't a lie. It just... Wasn't the whole truth. She'd left out the screaming mob of fans that accompanied her back to Fort Worth.

"_Another _con Hinata was a guest of?" Balmung said slyly, "You really _must _be her greatest fan."

"Hehe... Yep, that's me." Now it was the avatars turn to do the sweatdropping.

"Whatever. Can we _go_ now, Balmung?" came a gruff voice.

Meilin stood on tiptoe to see over Balmungs' shoulder better. The samurai stood holding his sword, rolling his eyes in boredom. She waved. "Hi, Sanjuro."

Balmung smiled and backed up a bit. "I've heard rumors about a field with amazing treasures. Mordicus is meeting us there with everyone else."

Her eyes lit up. "TREASUUUUUUUURE!" she yelled, jumping up and down. "YAY!"

Balmung programmed the keywords into the Chaos Gate. "Then, shall we go?"

-------------------------- Field Name: Beta, Chosen Hopeless Nothingness -----------------------

The appeared in the field in the midst of a battle, but as they drew their weapons for combat the last monster fell. Hotaru waved from far off. "It is good to see you again."

Meilin nodded, then turned and high-fived her younger sister. "Okay guys, let's go!" she called, beginning to chant her small rhyme. "I'm gettin me a treasure, a treasure, a treasure, a treasure, a treasure spelled R-A-R-E!" The other two girls laughed at Meilin's theme music of sorts and followed her south.

Sanjuro and Balmung hung back from the girls. "Balmung, why did you lie to her?" Sanjuro said, using whisper mode so the others couldn't hear.

"They don't have to know." Balmung whispered back.

"This is dangerous. They should know the risks."

"We won't involve them further unless we must."

"BALTAN!" Meilin called from the entrance. "C'mon! It's dungeon time!"

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Battling through the hoards of cursed blades, dark witches and Halloweens, the group descended four levels and stood before the boss door encased in purple flames. Kirika stopped dead. "Aren't boss door flames usually blue?" she hissed suspiciously. She never liked Balmung, so she wasn't too eager to dash into something that could be a glitch or worse, a hack.

Balmung had stopped dead as well, but not in surprise, in fear. Purple flames were and had always been the sign of data bugs. If there was one here...

"Who cares?" Meilin asked, ready for a brawl. "It's probably an UBER-rare item!" Ignoring the hesitance of the others, she cast her strengthen spells on herself and dashed headlong into the battle.

"Meilin, NO!"

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Meilin: And I'll end my prologue there for now. my chapters will usually be longer than this, but it'll do for now. Until next time, PLEASE REVIEW!


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